"The Spiritual Art of Heart-Keeping" -Sister Karen Jackson

We had the most beautiful and inspiring lesson in Relief Society yesterday. I tend to avoid the more emotional matters, but the conversations we had under this topic really seemed to resonate with me.

In the lesson we were given the metaphor of the "Hall closet", a closet where we jam all of our "junk" and hide it away from the rest of the house. The closet is then like our hearts, where we keep and store unnecessary and useless items for years on end, which only results in excessive clutter and wasted space where other more useful items could be stored. It can be so difficult to remove these things we have clung to for security, only to really honestly discover they are a crutch. I know I am definitely one to keep things longer than is necessary (which is so ironic because I throw almost every physical useless item away without a sentiment), and I was wasting too much space. The worst part about that is it takes away from other great things in my heart, not giving them the full attention they need.

It is definitely some food for thought... Don't we all have some things we have been keeping too long that are no longer of benefit to us?

Families are Forever

We have had such a wonderful time this past weekend with Brittany and Kelly that we almost forgot the real reason for their trip out here.



For those of you who don't know, my sister-in-law (Jared's sister) Brittany is having brain surgery today.

We love her and hope all will be well with her procedure. Please keep her in your prayers.

A letter to my nemesis....

Dear Callie,


I don't like you.

Not one bit.





Why, you might ask, do I hate such an 'adorable' creature?


Let me count the ways......


1. You smell, constantly. No bath can defeat the stench that is Callie.

2. You are annoying. Any time I have food, cook food, eat food, or even think about food you are at my feet begging. And you wont stop!


3. You eat all kinds of gross things, which you'd think, what's the problem with that? Well, 'adorable' dog, you...


4. throw up said foreign object on the carpet. No, not the wood or tile, but the carpet. It wouldn't be so bad if you had eaten a leaf, but a diaper? Come on. Which leads me to...


5. You have to be one of the dumbest creatures on the planet, next to sea sponges and plankton. At 13 years old you still urinate in the house, eat gross things (see previous point), and are incapable of listening to any commands.


Why do I tolerate you, rat-dog?



Well I can't get rid of you-- you're Sabrina's



And, well.... Nicholas loves you...

...more than me probably, if we're being honest.
So you can live.....


for now.

Photo explosion

It seems like it has been a while since I took many pictures, so this last weekend we dusted off the old Nikon to capture all the action (or lack thereof).

Jared finally took the GMAT! We would be more excited but he has to take the GRE as well. His new plan for school is to do a masters in Health Administration. He has a few favorite schools based on location (Berkeley, ASU), but I personally wouldn't mind living somewhere outside of the southwest US. This last weekend we finally had our daddy back and really enjoyed spending time with him. We finally got to go on a date too, but ended up staying home to play RockBandII while Nicholas was with Grandma.

Other than that it feels like we have been very busy, doing what I'm not quite sure.